Gifts and Donations Abroad

Gifts for Host Families

If you will be staying with a host family, it is a great idea to bring a usable/practical gift, such as pretty soaps or candles, lotions, nice picture frames, facial cleansers, aspirin/Tylenol, nice pens, etc. An even better idea is to buy something practical for the family after you have stayed with them and gotten to know their needs (ie a new rice cooker). I do not recommend sweets/chocolate, whether for your family or the organization where you will work, because few people see dentists.

Donations to the Organization Where You Will Work

Do not feel obligated to donate

Cosmic Volunteers does not require or expect you to make any donation above and beyond your program fee and your time volunteering (like for money, medical supplies, clothes, books, etc).

I really focus the programs and my own travels on donating one's time, energy, skills and compassion to others in need. Everyone is aware of our philosophy and approach, including Program Coordinators, host families, and the organizations where volunteers work.

However, I appreciate that resisting the urge to donate money or items is much easier said than done! There are so many obvious needs in many of the communities where you will live and volunteer. In fact, many volunteers tell us that they often feel overwhelmed because they want to help out so badly but don't know where to start. Should they buy notebooks and pens for a school, medical supplies for a clinic, or rice for an orphanage? Should they collect shoes, clothes, and donated supplies from home? Keep reading below...

If you decide to donate items

One very strong recommendation that I make to volunteers (which I follow myself):

If you want to donate items, whether to a school, orphanage, medical clinic etc: It is almost always better to buy the items in the host country rather than bring them from home.

Why? Several reasons:

1) You'll be sure to give items that are familiar to locals. Examples: medicines whose toleration/side effects are known to locals; culturally relevant flash cards; flip-flops that fit properly.

2) Locals can easily get more of the items when your supplies run out.

3) You'll be supporting local shops/vendors where you'll buy the items.

4) You'll have less stuff to pack in your bags from home.

5) I am not a big fan of the "Santa Claus" mentality where locals and foreigners expect the latter to always show up with material goodies. Also, new volunteers might be feel bad if they show up empty-handed.

[Note that stickers and bubbles are some of the few (immensely popular) items that have often been hard to find in places like Africa and India over the years!]

Don't forget: THERE IS NO SHORTAGE OF "STUFF" in Africa, Asia, and Latin America. Our program countries have legions of vendors in both urban and rural areas, selling shoes, clothes, food, pens, chalk, notebooks, cell phones, eyeglasses, sports equipment, over-the-counter medications, toiletries, etc. The major shortage for many locals is the money to buy them. (On every successive trip abroad, I see more and more $50k SUV's driving around even in rural areas, just an extreme example of the point I am making.)

I DO NOT RECOMMEND DONATING CASH to anyone abroad. Volunteers in the past have, for example, donated cash to orphanages in Ghana and India without any direction or oversight, simply hoping the orphanage directors would use it for things like food supplies (like rice) and school tuition. Unfortunately, I have seen so many instances where little-to-none of the cash gets spent on the children and ends up in individuals' pockets instead.

If you do go ahead and decide to give cash, the best chance of having it spent according to your wishes is for you to be physically present when purchases for items are made. For example, literally go to the food store with the orphanage director. Another example is school tuition: go to the school and hand the money to the principal, and have them give you a receipt or letter confirming the amount and the students benefiting. This all might seem tacky from a western perspective, but you're not in Kansas anymore!

Finally

I appreciate that some of the above might seem harsh or even a bit of hyperbole, but it is neither. And I will grant that others have probably had different experiences with donating items and cash to people abroad. Also there are many honest and caring people in our program countries who run orphanages, clinics, schools, AIDS organizations, etc.

However, staying true to the approach I've always taken, I prefer to give my clients the true picture of all that is involved in volunteering abroad, rather than a slick, sugar-coated version that many other organizations are happy to provide.

The thoughts in this article on donating items and cash abroad are based on my own experiences and those of hundreds of former volunteers during 10 years of traveling and working in developing countries, where there are different cultures, practices, and world-views so often different from those in the western world. To be sure, the western world has as much if not more corruption than in our program countries, but our volunteers with donations often have to deal with it on the street-level abroad.

-- Scott Burke, Cosmic Volunteers